The efficacy of blood conservation technique for coronary artery bypass graft surgery

: To evaluate the efficacy of blood conservation technique at our center, 144 patients undergoing primary coronary artery bypass grafting were studied between Jan. 1988, and Dec. 1990. Combined intraoperative and postoperative autotransfusion technique reduced the requirement of homologous blood to a half and 24% of the patients were without homologous transfusion. With more use of dilutional autotransfusion, 41% of the patients were without homologous transfusion. Intraoperative and postoperative autotransfusion technique is effective and dilutional autotransfusion is also a relatively effective method to reduce homologous transfusion.